On March 20, the Paradise Comics crew, with the help of Jim McLauchlin of
ACTOR and Scott Talmadge from CGC went to the POW Entertainment offices in Los
Angeles for a signing with Stan “The Man” Lee.

The special signing had been set up by Paradise and A.C.T.O.R. due to Stan
being unable to attend the upcoming April 28-30 Paradise Comics TORONTO COMICON
in Toronto, Canada. A donation to A.C.T.O.R. – A Commitment to Our Roots was to
be made for every item signed, and Paradise collected just under 400 items from
fans and collectors for this special event.

Being that Stan is the busiest man in comics, he could only spare a half an
hour from his hectic schedule for the signing before heading off for a
screening. Could it be done in a mere 30 minutes? It seemed an impossible
task!

While “Amazing”, “Incredible” and “Uncanny” are adjectives that can be used
to describe his most famous creations, they can also be applied to “The Man”
himself , who with the help of five able-bodied assistants unbagged and rebagged
the comic books and graphic novels Stan transformed from humble comics statesman
to the Invincible Signing Machine.

Stan was in fantastic humor, chatting away about different comics and
covers. Since Stan had directly supervision over all Silver Age Marvel Comics he
was able to point out many specifics on why he did or didn’t do something on
specific covers. He touched upon some of his spectacular new projects in the
pipeline and what it was like to be the industry’s premiere statesman. He would
also pause to note the occasional signature already on some of the books
including Rascally Roy Thomas, Jumping Jim Lee, and Jazzy John Romita. He was
amazed at some of the books that people had submitted from Amazing
Fantasy #15, to multiple copies of Fantastic Four #1, Amazing
Spider-Man #1 and X-Men #1, just to name a few. Nearly every Silver
Age key was present and a stunning array of modern Marvels.

“You’ve got a lot of the good ones here!” Lee proclaimed.

Then came the countdown, 3 minutes… 2 minutes… 1 minute… 30 seconds,
it was going to be close… 10 seconds, and right down to the wire the final
book was done with no time to spare. No mere mortal could have achieved this
sensational signing spotlight.

Then it was time for a quick group picture, a handshake or five and Stan
was off to stop Galactus from eating a delicatessen on Santa Monica
Blvd.